How Long Should You Look at a Work of Art?

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Institutions Participating in Slow Art Day: www.slowartday.com/2019-venues/
Learn more about how to observe art:
Visual Literacy - www.vislit.org/the-art-of-seei...
Visual Thinking Strategies - vtshome.org/
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Sources & Further Reading:
How Long Do You Need to Look at a Work of Art to Get It? www.artsy.net/article/artsy-e...
How Long Do People Really Spend Looking at Art in Museums? www.artsy.net/article/artsy-e...
Paying More Attention to Paying Attention: www.informalscience.org/news-v...
Timing and Tracking: Unlocking Visitor Behavior: www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/1...
The Art of Slowing Down in a Museum: www.nytimes.com/2014/10/12/tr...
Spending Time on Art: journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/...
Time spent viewing art and reading labels: psycnet.apa.org/record/2016-1...
Images:
New York - Metropolitan Museum Of Art "George Washington Crossing the Delaware” by David Ohmer. CC BY 2.0 www.flickr.com/photos/the-o/2...
European paintings at Metropolitan Museum of Art by André Lage Freitas. CC BY-SA 3.0
commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi...
Metropolitan Museum of Art by Phil Roeder. CC BY 2.0 www.flickr.com/photos/tabor-r...
Metropolitan Museum of Art by Phil Roeder. CC BY 2.0 www.flickr.com/photos/tabor-r...
Art Institute of Chicago by Tripp. CC BY 2.0 www.flickr.com/photos/trippch...
Art Institute of Chicago by Phil Roeder. CC BY 2.0 www.flickr.com/photos/tabor-r...
Gallery by John Benson. CC BY 2.0 www.flickr.com/photos/j_benso...
MoMA Vir Heroicus Sublimis by Regan Vercruysse. CC BY 2.0 www.flickr.com/photos/rverc/8...
Saatchi Gallery by Herry Lawford. CC BY 2.0 www.flickr.com/photos/herry/3...
Art Gallery of NSW by Merryjack. CC BY 2.0 www.flickr.com/photos/merryja...
Inside Bodegas Tradicion's gallery by Andrew Wilkinson. CC BY 2.0 www.flickr.com/photos/andrew_...
Sounds:
Pop, Low, A (H1).wav by Inspector J. CC BY 3.0 freesound.org/people/Inspecto...

[@359339]

I follow intuition instead of trying to force interest, which means I can skim a lot of paintings and then fall in deeply with one or two. Most recently I was absorbed by an Alice Rich painting, a spring toned semi-abstract landscape of clouds reflected in smooth water, with strips of black interrupting, hinting at telephone poles.

[@kelleenbrx6649]

I prefer this as well. I scan over lots of pieces until I find one I really like to look at. There's a sorrowful Mary in the Bodemusem from a closed church. It's a wooden sculpture, painted with glass insets for the eyes and tears. I can spend about 10 minutes staring at it. The eyes are so life-like.

[@Corporis]

I spend the longest looking at art on beer labels. Over the course of any given introverted night, I'll probably spend 5 minutes staring at the label as I pick and peel it apart from the bottle. Thing is, a lot of the time, these labels are AMAZING

[@Menstral]

I would contend that mass produced images are design. Only the original is in the running for the consideration of art.

[@erikvalkman9640]

@@Menstral Thou art an Art snob, rather than an art lover, my dear.

[@CityBeautiful]

Love this video! I'm always more inclined to take a long look at a piece of art if it has a bench in front of it. I guess I'm lazy!

[@EladLerner]

I spent a huge amount of time looking at every detail of the works at the M.C. Escher Museum in The Hague. Because, well... It's M.C. Escher! He purposefully filled every corner of his engravings with little hidden gems. Seeing is for myself for the first time not on a low qaulity print or digital version made me appreciate all his work even more.

[@aguti1111]

Most Caravaggio paintings - the lighting amazes me every time

[@Menstral]

Chiaroscuro is indeed desirable, even in the modern day: Bryan Leboeuf: Mosh Pit, 2003 arthistoryunf.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/beck-1.png?w=436

[@agregory]

Van Gogh's self portrait (1889). I had the privilege of seeing it in person a couple of years ago and spent several minutes with it. I drifted through delight, awe, sadness, etc. I loved and explored the brush strokes (especially in the background). There were a couple others that I paused in front of, but this was the only painting that I really spent time with. Slow art day sounds like an interesting idea. I'll try it.

[@12tone]

Very cool video! This is something I definitely struggle with at art museums: I enjoy being there, but I find that I move through galleries a lot faster than most of the people I'm with. I'm not really sure why, and there's definitely times where I find one piece that just captivates me for a long time, but it's something I wind up thinking about a lot so it's cool to get some more perspectives on it.

[@ecrivonlunyx]

Hi 12tone! Maybe allowing yourself multiple visits can help with that FOMO that might be affecting your experience if that's what's happening? I think experimenting with different ways of enjoying things can always teach us something useful about ourselves or the thing itself, even if that's just to cross that method off of your different strategies, but regardless of my take! To each their own! Since art is about what makes us "happy" and whatnot. Love your stuff :)

[@Dev1nci]

Aaah yes 💪🏻 thought you’d stopped making vids. Thankfully I’m subbed because I love these. 👌🏿

[@MaraK_dialmformara]

I think I could spend 20+ minutes contemplating a single piece of Magic: the Gathering card art. Right now, I’m looking at Ryan Pancoast’s art for the soon-to-be-released card Tolsimir, Friend to Wolves, which depicts an armored elf and wolf fighting their way through a horde of zombies. There’s so much wonderful detail in the armor, the subjects’ emotions are readily accessible (more so at large scale than at the size of a trading card), and even the blurry background has color and tone details that mesh with the rest of the set.

[@yourcurtainsareugly]

There are TONS of pieces of art I could - and have - spent many hours with, in some cases hundreds. None of them are paintings, photos, or sculptures. Personally, the draw of static art is very limited. In general, I don't spend a lot of time with esthetics and try to deemphasize them in my life. I don't believe I've ever purchased something for myself for purely esthetic value, and I've commented on earlier videos how much I enjoy modernist ideas, particularly that form should follow function and eschew ornamentation. That said, I do value experiences, so I spend a lot of time with multimedia, and interactive media (e.g. games) specifically, especially VR. You might think me narrow-minded for, say, not caring if all these museums suddenly disappeared, but I think it's telling that a video on the consumption of works of art solely focuses on paintings, photos, and a few sculptures - your standard museum stuff ("fine art") - when there's a whole world of movies, video games, music, performance, and beyond out there.

[@NawidN]

They're both good. One shouldn't neglect one for the other.

[@yourcurtainsareugly]

@@NawidN Why? As I said, I don't generally value things for esthetics, so fine art doesn't really do anything for me. I'm explicitly telling you I don't like X but you're saying that everyone should spend time on X like it's some universal truth. There's no accounting for taste, so why should I conform to yours? But in the broader point I was making, why is only fine art worthy of this slow appreciation?

[@NawidN]

@@yourcurtainsareugly This is the first time I'm seeing a question follow after its answer.

[@yourcurtainsareugly]

@@NawidN If your answer is as vapid as "they're both good", then we have nothing more to discuss, troll.

[@StefanMilo]

Do you think there's a market for micro gallery showing just one painting? Slow art day sounds like a good idea too.

[@SergioLongoni]

I think that maybe not a "market" but is possible. I am from Milan in Italy and each year around Christmas a single artwork - usually a painting from the renascence - is displayed in the town hall. The display is free admittance. Also in Milan there are a lot of temporary display that are usually focused around a single masterpiece, that is usually surrounded whit other artworks for context.

[@VeryPrivateGallery]

Hi, I love the idea! In Madrid there is a micro gallery (more like a storefront), just the size of a doble bed.

[@RazzTheKing]

The Garden of Earthly Delights

[@stevengreener2941]

Razz That painting proves that time travel is real.

[@RazzTheKing]

@@stevengreener2941 How come?

[@saammmy7]

I often wish I had more time to look at individual pieces of art. But usually I visit art museums while travelling and don't have enough time for multiple visits and don't know when I'll be in that city again so I don't wanna miss out on anything. Usually I compromise by doing a quick walk through and then going back to the pieces that really grabbed my attention. I envy everybody lucky enough to live near a big art museum :)

[@remcolangbroek656]

It is entirely up to the viewer to decide how long he or she should look at a work of art. It's kind of a vague question. Long enough to do what? To reproduce it? (In my case probably an eternity) Or to have a meaningful discussion? Meaningful to whom? With whom? Or... Wait a minute... It's a retorical question, isn't it? You got me there!

[@chenxinhan7678]

Ur back!!! Makes me so happy:) great vid as usual!!

[@SergioLongoni]

Recently I have visited the Scrovegni Chapel - one of Giotto's masterpieces - in Padova. Due to conservation issues, you are allowed to spend only 15 minutes in the chapel with a small group of visitors. Before you enter you get a video of 15 minutes that explain the artwork and point out a lot of things to look for in your visit. 15 minutes for such a complex series of frescos are not as nearly as enough: you could literally spend hours

[@brandonjslea1562]

What I like about modern mediums is that they have ways of being much more naturally captivating.

[@RooftopArtistVlog]

Concise, informative and to the point. Thank you very much for addressing the issue in such a lively way, so the viewer is not bored, but rather driven to find more about the subject. Cheers.

[@ARTiculations]

Thank you so much I’m so flattered!! ❤️

[@abz2000123]

I often struggle with art too, it's all over the internet and not a few days go by but I feel an unexplainable urge to view some art, and sometimes I spend hour's staring at the audacious pieces with incredulous wonder at how people were perform in the process of innovating ever new expressions of art that are actually shocking when one returns to their senses.

[@MatthewHoHiWorld]

Yay you're back!

[@christiandevey3898]

Probably the art that I pay most attention to is album cover art for music. I often don’t look at the covers with too much detail (partially because I only see them on Spotify where the picture is small), but sometimes I will spend time looking at the art and realize a detail I hadn’t noticed before. It took me longer than I’d care to admit that the cover of Led Zeppelin III has a bunch of drawings as opposed to colours splattered across a white background (in my defence there is only one song I listen to from that album) I think that I won’t be interested in art unless it is connected to something I’m already interested in. Other than album covers, I also look at flags and maps. I am interested in countries so I like flags, however they are usually quite simple and don’t have much detail to analyze so I don’t spend a long time looking at a single flag’s detail. With maps, I think that many old maps are beautifully drawn; however I am able to appreciate them more if I am seeing the map in person rather than a picture online.

[@385x01y]

Yay 😊 you are back. After that tweet I was afraid you would quit making videos. Make them at your own pace, don't force a schedule, btw I just realised i really have no art pices in my house, unless you consider everything to be art, then I will look at my plush toys and pretend they are sculptures.

[@MaraK_dialmformara]

385x01y do you play board/card/video games? There’s a lot of art in those, not to mention cover art on books.

[@385x01y]

@@MaraK_dialmformara You got me with cover art on books, But also cover art on CDs

[@miriampaternoster9798]

very interesting! I'll show it to my students :)

[@AerialFrameworks]

Hello, I’m hoping that you’ll read this because I’d like to help you out. I love your channel! When you are editing your videos make sure that you get your Decibel to -1.0 or so so that when they get compressed by the KZbin compressor they don’t come off too quiet. If you would like to increase the volume of your videos, you can use a simple program like audacity to increase the gain or something like GarageBand to apply a compressor and increase the gain on the signal. I love your videos, but I’d like to hear them too! :-)

[@MsDafiM]

As to me, the answer is simple, I can look at a Mark Rothko painting for twenty minutes without even noticing. I get completely lost inside the colors and the emotions they evoke. And i'm totally guilty of trying to see too much in a museum when i visit - I usually try to pick the exhibition I want to see most and give it as much attention as I can, but most of the time I try to squeeze in a bit of other exhibitions, too, especially if they seem interesting. I had no idea that was an actual metric for such a thing, thank you so much for this video! It was really interesting and educating.

[@dmytrom297]

In Kiev’s Pinchuk art was a competative exhibition. There was a work “me, myself and I”. There was a bot with a video projetion of a woman constantly rearanging stuff on the floor...her actions appeared pointless but jist sat there to make sense pf it. People were freaked though, because the bot was small ot must have looked like a boy staring into cupboard while sitting on the floor...I wonder if anyone’s mistaken me for a performer, that’d be funny.

[@MaraK_dialmformara]

Дмитрий There’s an equivalent English idiom “me, myself, and I.” I wonder if that’s how the title is officially translated into English.

[@dmytrom297]

Mara K It might, thank you

[@laptop006]

I will probably enjoy slow art day tomorrow, just at a computer museum, not a gallery. Industrial design totally counts right?

[@KhAnubis]

One thing that‘ll definitely hook me into a painting is if it tells a story, or paints a picture (literally) of what life was like in the time it was painted. Though this is definitely good advice, as I plan to meet up with a couple other KZbinrs at the Portland Art Museum tonight. By the way, glad to see you upload again! I was getting a bit worried, if I‘m completely honest.

[@Menstral]

Théodore Chassériau - Deux Soeurs. The Two Sisters is an 1843 oil painting on canvas by the French romantic artist Théodore Chassériau. Most old paintings were of the same old boring cr@p.... ugly and often old pompous rich people, and the same religious scenes or icons. Sometime you have the 'Instagram hotties of their day' captured by men of talent, but this painting is special. The man of talent managed to capture family and classy beauty in one go. I gave it three rounds of 10 minutes each. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Two_Sisters_(Chass%C3%A9riau_painting)

[@Payneless]

Barnett Newman - Midnight Blue. I saw it in Cologne when I was there and I don't know it kinda just entranced me.

[@Mikearoniandcheese]

Welcome back Betty, missed your lovely face. Let's not forget that throughout history, it has been common for rulers, the elite, and the church to commission public art as a means of demonstrating power and wealth, or even for specific propaganda purposes. But art was also used to tell a story...known as 'Narrative art'. The artist would have the power to tell a story and control how we feel, but the artist would also educate people because most common folks were illiterate, during the classic times. I can speculate that during the Renaissance people had more time to view pieces of art than people do today because of the short attention span, always on the go, and distractions of a saturated modern world we live today. Most Christian churches have stain glass windows that depict the events in the Bible especially referencing Jesus. Again telling the story through a visual interpretation at the same time educating the people. Some pieces of art have enough detail or hiding messages left by the artist that one can spend hours if not days just trying to figure what they are trying to say. Then there are other pieces of art where one can just be in awe of the beauty of the work, fine lines, delicate stokes, the use of color, or even just the subject matter. I was like you when visiting a museum or new exhibit, I used to rush through the exhibit or halls and I would try to make a second pass to encase I missed something. Now I try to take more time and let my brain enter bliss. Two exhibits that stand out and I had the pleasure of seeing in my home town. Was the Frida Kahlo exhibit at the SFMOMA which included approximately 50 of her paintings. Yes you can say I spent more the 20 minutes slowly inhaling the hauntingly seductive and often brutal self-portraits. It was kind of hard not be drawn into each piece of work. The other exhibit was the 'Girl with a Pearl Earring' by Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer at the de Young. I was in a state of art nirvana. Like a beautiful girl in front of me...I can't think, I can't speak..I just stared and stared. I am not sure how much time I spent in front of that piece but it was no less than a hour. It was exquisite, the beauty of the lines, the attention to detail, the soft strokes used on the delicate soft luscious and kissable lips and the lighting providing a soft edge of shadow across the angelic face was way to mesmerizing. Kinda like watching you in your videos.

[@KartvelArca]

Damn, Betty and Grey really are one of the most intellectual couples i know, Great video btw, i hope your channel becomes as popular as grey one day

[@HAL-oj4jb]

I know it's an old video but I'm just now discovering your channel (love it btw, especially the stuff on architecture) so I don't care lol. Some of the most interesting artworks I've ever seen were the paintings by Anselm Kiefer in the Guggenheim in Bilbao, Spain. I spent definitely 20 minutes with The Land of the Two Rivers, I was looking at other paintings in the room there too but after each one I returned to that one because it just didn't let me go haha

[@ARTiculations]

Thank you so much!! Glad you are enjoying the videos. Slow Art Day is coming again - April 2, 2022! So I'm always happy about people watching this video no matter when it is =)

[@augustin4374]

I think that one of the work of art I can spend most time looking at it is the denderah zodiac in the Louvre Museum and, already in France, in the national architecture museum (cité de l'architecture) in the rooms where facsimile of most beautiful romanese painting of french church are installed

[@ArtCreamProject]

Very interesting channel! The Art Cream videos are a bit same topic maybe you will find it interesting as well? I think there should be more channels about Art on You Tube

[@matamoney]

I was just at LACMA the other day and thought about the exact same thing. Like how artists can spend years on one painting just for people to look at it for thirty seconds

[@the1annex]

Artworks that I can spend a lot of time with are usually highly detailed or interactive pieces.

[@MisterAnonymousOwO]

An artwork I can spend many minutes looking at? I’d say stuff like installation art, which makes me fully immerse myself in the area and such :3

[@rhysejdanino2098]

Does anyone know what the picture is at 1:24? The one with the umbrellas? I really like it.

[@lancelovecraft5913]

Uhh I have a real big problem with giving myself museum fatigue. I will arrive at a gallery and spend about a minute or two with EVERY price one after the other. Not to mention I read every description intentivley, trying to learn all I can. After a room and a half of doing so I start to burn out and fail to truly absorb the info presented. I think I need to do slow art day every time I visit

[@LayilaFaon]

the time you need to understand this work :))

[@Symbioticism]

I've passed some seriously worthwhile time staring at a Rothko, Pollock, or Bacon. Not how I always deal with an art gallery, but never disappointing.

[@e.v.martinez5083]

Van Gogh because I like yellow!

[@the1annex]

Often I "move on" even when I would like to keep on looking. I often feel "in the way" of other visitors.

[@zhidong5780]

Niceeeeeee

[@skpjoecoursegold366]

that was my guess.......30 seconds. and that's what i'm pretty sure i do. most of the Hudson Art i'll view much longer, 3 minutes maybe.

[@sabahfatema]

Since I have my exams fast approaching, I will pick 5 from the comments section below and stare at them for long hours of time. Somethings better than not.

[@abstractbybrian]

Any of the abstract artists.

[@cliftonfowler5063]

narcissus by Salvador dali.

[@UndecidedDolphin]

I think anyone can spend more than ten minuets on Guernica by the man himself.

[@NawidN]

Interesting username. Can he really?

[@Languslangus]

Grohar is the best. Look @ Grohars work for long

[@nolankuo937]

I find that bringing a sketch pad and sketching the artwork can help me better appreciate the work of art. You really get appreciation for the techniques the artist uses.

[@xja85mac]

A snap went missing...

[@ARTiculations]

I forgot to record it :’(

[@nojnavick]

0 seconds

[@AcademyofComposition]

27 seconds??? That is outrageous, pathetic, and horrible!!! It's shameful. But we can't blame folks because most simply have no idea what to look for. This is why I am committed to helping folks identify museum-quality art. When I visit a museum, I usually take 20-40 minutes per painting and really see .... or better said, READ ... 5-8 paintings. If you know how to decode masterfully composed works of art, it's more like reading a book. It's is a tremendous, educational, and sometimes life-changing experience. Thank you for this video. I am still shocked at 27 seconds. But I should not.

[@dondo44]

Amount of time looking at a work of art depends on how I am feeling, who am with, and how much time I have.